Friday, March 29, 2019

There will be a protest Monday at 11am against Cook County state's attorney Kim Foxx organized by the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police at the County Building, which is at 69 W. Washington in the Loop.

Chicago is of course better known as MAGA Country.

I've been to a few of these--my guess is that most of the action will be at Daley Plaza a few steps away.

Foxx is the leftist Democrat quasi-prosecutor who dropped the charges against hate crime hoaxster Jussie Smollett.

As always, my fellow patriots, speak up but obey the law--don't block traffic like the leftists do.

Make signs with big letters so television viewers see them. Wear patriotic and pro-police hats and clothing if you have them.

The Smollett family was very tight the Obamas. Ben Shapiro wonders if compromised Crook County state's attorney Kim Foxx, as a favor to Christina M. "Tina" Tchen, Michelle Obama's former chief of staff, dropped the charges against the hate crime hoaxter as a favor to those in the Obama orbit.

State’s Attorney Kim Foxx did not "formally" recuse herself from the Jussie Smollett case, her office said in a statement Thursday, explaining that Foxx used the term "recuse" in a "colloquial" sense rather than a legal sense when she left the case in February.

The statement was the latest twist in the saga centering around Smollett, the "Empire" actor whom Foxx's office decided not to prosecute Tuesday in a stunning reversal after Smollett faced a 16-count indictment for allegedly staging an assault against himself in January.

Foxx announced Feb. 19 that she was leaving the case, clarifying later that her decision stemmed from her contact with a relative of Smollett. But Thursday's statement said Foxx's decision was not based "on any actual conflict of interest," implying that Foxx was concerned about the appearance of a conflict.

"Instead, in an abundance of caution, she informally separated herself from the decision-making over the case and left it to her First Assistant State’s Attorney Joe Magats, a 29-year veteran prosecutor," the statement added. "Although we used the term ‘recuse’ as it relates to State’s Attorney Foxx’s involvement in this matter, it was a colloquial use of the term rather than in its legal sense."

Thursday, March 28, 2019

In the Chicago Sun-Times, Michael Sneed reports that Chicago, also known as MAGA Country, wants to hit hoaxter Jussie Smollet in the pocketbook.

The city on Thursday laid out the cost of the investigation into the alleged hate crime against actor Jussie Smollett and demanded the “Empire” star pay the city $130,000.

In a letter from the Chicago Corporation Counsel sent to Smollett's lawyers Thursday afternoon, officials said the total cost of the overtime the Chicago Police logged to investigate the crime was considerably more than the $10,000 Smollett agreed to forfeit after charges against him for allegedly staging the attack on Jan. 29 were dropped Tuesday.

"The Chicago Police Department conducted an extensive investigation into this report," the letter sent to attorney Patricia Brown Holmes' office says. "Over two dozen detectives and police officers participated in the investigation, ultimately spending weeks investigating the false claims, including a substantial number of overtime hours."

"My recommendation to the president," Cameron reported on Twitter, "go to Opening Day baseball, sit on the sideline, stay out of this! You created a toxic environment where Jussie Smollett thought he could create a hoax about a hate crime.

Kim Foxx, the Chicago Democratic leftist behind the dropping of the charges against hoaxster Jussie Smollett, is panicking, according to the Chicago Tribune's John Kass:

And then came that panicky email Foxx’s office sent out, asking prosecutors for "examples of cases, felony preferable, where we, in exercising our discretion, have entered into verbal agreements with defense attorneys to dismiss charges against an offender if certain conditions were met, such as the payment of restitution, completion of community service, etc. but the defendant was not placed in a formal diversion program."

In other words: Please help me. I’ve screwed up, and I need examples to show people that what I did is really not all that unusual.

I asked a Cook County judge about this.

"How stupid is it to put in writing that you're advertising for excuses after the fact?" said the judge.

Wednesday, March 27, 2019

Chicago police came out swinging Wednesday and released the full 61-page investigative report in the alleged Jussie Smollett hate crime hoax, one day after charges against the "Empire" star were dramatically dropped — but the move prompted a moot court order.

The release of the documents came one day after Cook County prosecutors dismissed a 16-count indictment against the actor, saying they had cut a deal with the TV star to perform two days of community service and forfeit his $10,000 bond to the city.

The move made it possible for Smollett's attorneys to get his criminal case immediately sealed and wiped clean.

About an hour after the department released the files, the Chicago police reportedly became subject of a court order that barred them from releasing further files even though they were widely available online.

Notwithstanding the absurdity of his allegations and the meticulous work of the Chicago PD, the office of State’s Attorney Kim Foxx decided, without informing police officials or the Chicago mayor, to allow Smollett to walk away from the serious proceedings, practically scot-free. The charges were dropped, the case was sealed, and the only penalty Smollett faced at all was the forfeiture of his $10,000 posted bail.

The Chicago cops I spoke to were, without exception, apoplectic. Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson earlier said of Smollett: “I’ll continue to pray for this troubled young man who resorted to both drastic and illegal tactics to gain attention.” One of his commanders, Ed Wodnicki, described the dropping of charges as "absolutely a punch in the gut."

"We worked closely throughout our three-week investigation to get to the point where we arrested the offender," he added. "For the state's attorney at this point to dismiss charges without discussing this with us is just shocking."

For his part, Smollett remained smugly incorrigible. In a post-hearing press conference, he declared, "I would not be my mother’s son if I was capable of one drop of what I have been accused of.” He feigned that he would fight for the “betterment of marginalized people everywhere."

Victor Maggio provides more graphic footage for what the Chicago Police go through as they confront violence--including cars that are used as weapons--in the second part of his video series, In the Line of Duty Chicago.

Saturday, March 23, 2019

A longtime favorite of the blog is the Rainmakers. Partly because they are not politically correct. Partly because they are "the bomb." After all, they infuriated the liberals with their anthem "Government Cheese."

The Kansas City-based band barely registers--which is a pity--in the United States but they are huge in Norway. Gud velsigne Norge!
Here are the Rainmakers in 2012 at the Rockefeller Music Hall in Oslo--with frontman Bob Walkenhorst playing snare--pounding out "Johnny Reb."

Friday, March 22, 2019

My friend Victor Maggio of Bloody Chicago begins a new series today, "In the Line of Duty, Chicago."

Warning: This video contains foul language and graphic violence.

Maggio--without pulling punches--looks at what the CPD endures when confronted by violent criminals.

Sometimes the cops get it wrong, as you'll learn in the case of the fatal police shooting of Paul O'Neill.

Other times police officers jeopardize their safety, such as in the incident of the brutal beating of a cop who chose not to shoot a drugged up criminal because she was afraid to subject herself and her family to negative national scrutiny. That's part the unfortunate fallout after the Laquan McDonald killing.

The inbound lanes of the Dan Ryan Expressway were shut down for more than three hours Friday morning, as Illinois State Police investigated a shooting that left a 24-year-old woman wounded.

The victim and a bullet-filled sedan were found at a Church's Chicken parking lot at 59th and State streets. Illinois State Police said the 24-year-old woman told investigators she was shot several times around 2:45 a.m. in the inbound lanes of the Dan Ryan near 79th Street.

She was being treated at the University of Chicago trauma center, where her condition was stabilized.

Former Obama White House Counsel and Clinton-linked attorney Greg Craig may soon be charged by the Justice Department for engaging in illegal unregistered overseas lobbying, in a case initially probed by Special Counsel Robert Mueller -- a development that would make him the first Democrat to face prosecution amid the long-running Russia investigation.

The case centers on lobbying work that Craig performed in 2012 for the Russian-backed president of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych, while Craig was a partner at the law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. Craig allegedly never registered as a foreign agent under a U.S. law known as the Foreign Agents Registration Act, or FARA, which requires lobbyists to declare publicly if they represent foreign leaders, governments or their political parties.

FARA violations were only rarely prosecuted until Mueller took aim at Paul Manafort, President Trump's former campaign chairman, for his lobbying work in Ukraine. Manafort, who connected Craig with Yanukovych, has been convicted on numerous bank and tax fraud charges, and was separately accused of FARA violations as well. He was sentenced earlier this month to approximately seven years in prison.

Craig left Skadden last year as his work with Manafort became public. In January, Skadden agreed to cooperate with the DOJ's registration requirements and paid $4.6 million in a settlement to avoid a criminal prosecution. "We have learned much from this incident and are taking steps to prevent anything similar from happening again,” the firm said in a statement at the time

Thursday, March 14, 2019

In 1960, Dwight D. Eisenhower was asked about the accomplishments of Richard Nixon, who was by then the Republican nominee to succeed him in the White House. Ike's answer was a serious wound for Nixon, "If you give me a week, I might think of one. I don’t remember."

Today when asked at a press briefing about the achievements in the House of Representatives by of Robert "Beto" O'Rourke, Nancy Pelosi, the current Speaker couldn't name any.

Former Texas Rep. Beto O'Rourke warned Thursday in his first presidential campaign stop that parts of the planet will soon become uninhabitable, driving a massive wave of climate 'refugees' across the U.S. border, if America's government doesn't adopt emergency measures within the next 12 years.

O'Rourke, 46, had formally announced an hour earlier that he will seek the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, ending months of speculation over whether he would try to translate his newfound political celebrity into a White House bid.

In the southwestern Iowa town of Keokuk, a sweater-clad Beto told a smallish crowd that by the time his 12-year-old son is his age "we may not be able to live in cities that we call home today, like El Paso, Texas. We may not be able to grow our own food and fiber, feed and clothe ourselves in this country."

Tuesday, March 12, 2019

Trish Regan interviews Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó, who is inviting Democratic House leftists Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ihlan Omar to see for themselves the disaster that once prosperous Venezuela is.

Like Gov. Bruce Rauner after his first months in office, Gov. J.B. Pritzker's job approval rating has tumbled.
So low, that President Donald Trump has a higher approval rating.

In a We Ask America poll conducted last week, 800 registered Illinois voters gave Pritzker a job approval rating of 37 percent. The pollsters asked "Do you approve or disapprove of the job J.B. Pritzker is doing as Illinois governor," to which 37 percent approved, 36 disapproved and 27 percent had no opinion.

When asked the same question about President Donald Trump, pollsters received a 41 percent positive response, but also had a higher total disapproval rate because fewer respondents had no opinion of the president.

Ideas Illinois president Greg Baise, who commissioned the poll, said Pritzker is likable, but his proposals for higher taxes and spending aren’t going over well.

Sadly, probably not. But Mark Dice exposes a bunch of so-called experts discussing things they know nothing about, including former CIA director John Brennan and MSNBC's Chuck Todd, a Democratic operative pretending to be a journalist.

Thursday, March 07, 2019

When you mix politics with entertainment, you risk angering your audience, and in television, where many viewers have thousands of choices available from their remote, such a move can be dangerous.

Yes, I was a fan and regular viewer of Doctor Who. But when a so-so actress, Jodi Whittaker, was hired to become the next Doctor--after five decades of having a male portraying what everyone knew was a male character, I tuned out.

Why couldn't the BBC produce a new series with a female Time Lord instead?

Well, as I expected, ratings are in the toilet, at least in Great Britain, for the Whittaker Who run.

But the "woke" can never admit they are wrong. And indeed the left is wrong a lot

BBC bosses are planning on moving the show to its original evening slot after a steady ratings slide during Jodie ­Whittaker’s debut series.

The Sunday run kicked off with 8.2 million viewers in October but had slipped to 5.2 million for the last episode in December.

An insider revealed: “There is a feeling families are freer to watch on Saturdays than Sundays, when kids have homework to finish.

"While the show rated well overall, there were concerns over the decline in audience."

You got that? Let me repeat that last sentence from the Mirror. "While the show rated well overall, there were concerns over the decline in audience."That insider is clueless and this story reminds me of what the Wall Street Journal's James Taranto calls "the Butterfield effect."

One of those so-called "rising stars" of the Democratic Party, US Rep. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, has made many anti-Semitic comments. To offer cover, the Democrats in the House decided to draft a resolution to condemn anti-Semitism.

But the anti-Semitic wing of the Democratic Party--yes, there is such a thing--rebelled, now the Dems plant to issue a broader resolution to condemn all bigotry.

But as Andrew McCarthy noted on Twitter, "Brilliant point by @JonahNRO on @SpecialReport - Dems can’t agree on anti-Semitism condemnation because it’s not inclusive of other condemnable bigotry. But anyone who reacted to “Black Lives Matter” by daring to say ALL lives matter was condemned by Left as racially insensitive."

Brilliant point by @JonahNRO on @SpecialReport - Dems can’t agree on anti-Semitism condemnation because it’s not inclusive of other condemnable bigotry. But anyone who reacted to “Black Lives Matter” by daring to say ALL lives matter was condemned by Left as racially insensitive.

Yesterday House Speaker Nancy Pelosi dismissed criticism of Omar by claiming she didn't "intend" to make those anti-Semitic remarks.

At the very least Omar needs to be removed from her post on the House Foreign Relations Committee.

The president weighed in yesterday on Twitter, "It is shameful that House Democrats won’t take a stronger stand against Anti-Semitism in their conference. Anti-Semitism has fueled atrocities throughout history and it’s inconceivable they will not act to condemn it!"

It is shameful that House Democrats won’t take a stronger stand against Anti-Semitism in their conference. Anti-Semitism has fueled atrocities throughout history and it’s inconceivable they will not act to condemn it!

Dozens of workers at Northwestern Hospital may have been fired for improperly reviewing the medical records of Jussie Smollett, who was treated at the emergency room after he claimed he had been attacked by two men.

Sources say those workers have been terminated after gaining access to the "Empire" actor’s medical chart. Smollett has since been charged with staging the whole incident.

One of the nurses says it was a misunderstanding and claims she never even accessed Smollett's chart.

But she was fired last week and believes many other nurses and staffers were fired for the same reason.

Federal authorities have charged two relatives of Harvey Mayor Eric Kellogg, two Harvey police officers, and two others in three separate criminal cases on Wednesday, hours after FBI agents raided the Harvey Police Department, and an office at the south suburban city hall.

Federal prosecutors said the defendants include 66-year-old Rommell Kellogg, the mayor’s brother, and 63-year-old Corey Johnson, a cousin of the mayor.

Rommell Kellogg and Corey Johnson both are charged with conspiracy to commit extortion. Prosecutors said the two conspired to extort payments from a strip club owner from 2012 through 2016, threatening the city would shut down the club if they weren’t paid. In exchange for the payments, city officials allegedly allowed the club to operate, "knowing acts of prostitution were occurring onsite."

Also charged were Harvey police officers Derrick Muhammad and Derrick Moore, who both are charged with obstruction of justice and conspiracy to obstruct justice. Prosecutors said they falsified a police report to protect two acquaintances – a father and son – from possible gun charges of illegal possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

Wait, didn't I run with a story yesterday about a former Chicago alderman who plans to plea guilty to corruption charges? I did. I'm not repeating myself. This post is about a current Chicago alderman pleading guilty.

Four months after rejecting a plea deal that his attorney said would have resulted in minimal jail time, and opting to go to trial on fraud and bribery charges, Ald. Willie Cochran (20th) again is scheduled to plead guilty in federal court.

In November, prosecutors and defense attorneys revealed plea negotiations had broken down in Cochran’s case, and U.S. District Judge Jorge Alonso scheduled a jury trial for June 3.

On Tuesday, Alonso scheduled a change of plea hearing for March 21, signaling Cochran appears ready to accept a deal to avoid a trial. Cochran is charged with 11 counts of wire fraud, two counts of extortion, and two counts of bribery.

When Cochran rejected a plea deal in November, defense attorney Christopher Grohman said, "He couldn't stomach the idea of admitting to something he believes he did not do."

Over in the 14th Ward, Ed Burke, until recently chairman of the powerful City Council Finance Committee--and who has been an alderman since 1969--haw been charged in a federal criminal complaint.

Since 1973 over 30 members of Chicago's City Council have been sentenced to federal prison.

New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Saikat Chakrabarti, the progressive firebrand's multimillionaire chief of staff, apparently violated campaign finance law by funneling nearly $1 million in contributions from political action committees Chakrabarti established to private companies that he also controlled, according to an explosive complaint filed Monday with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and obtained by Fox News.

Amid the allegations, a former FEC commissioner late Monday suggested in an interview with The Daily Caller News Foundation that Ocasio-Cortez and her team could separately be facing major fines and potentially even jail time if they were knowingly and willfully violating the law by hiding their control of the Justice Democrats political action committee (PAC). Such an arrangement could have allowed Ocasio-Cortez's campaign to receive donations in excess of the normal limit, by pooling contributions to both the PAC and the campaign itself.

The FEC complaint asserts that Chakrabarti established two PACs, the Brand New Congress PAC and Justice Democrats PAC, and then systematically transferred more than $885,000 in contributions received by those PACs to the Brand New Campaign LLC and the Brand New Congress LLC -- companies that, unlike PACs, are exempt from reporting all of their significant expenditures. The PACs claimed the payments were for "strategic consulting."

Although large financial transfers from PACs to LLCs are not necessarily improper, the complaint argues that the goal of the "extensive" scheme was seemingly to illegally dodge detailed legal reporting requirements of the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971, which are designed to track campaign expenditures.

Three more DSA candidates also forced run-offs against incumbent aldermen in Chicago.

"The oligarchs are shaking in their boots tonight," Ramirez-Rosa, who defeated challenger Amanda Yu Dieterich in Chicago's 35th, said, according to the Chicago Sun-Times. "Our continued organizing and movement-building over the last four years is paying dividends. And it appears to be a total transformation of political power at City Hall from the bottom up."

Of course Ramirez-Rosa doesn't mention Chicago's middle class--because it is almost extinct in Chicago.

While he later became a Republican--I don't know what party he is a member of now--"Fast Eddie" at one time was the chairman of the Cook County Regular Democratic Organization, that is "the Machine." That was left out of the below report.

Former Alderman Edward R. Vrdolyak plans to change his plea to guilty Thursday for a federal tax charge tied to a tobacco settlement scheme that alleges he and an associate failed to pay taxes on millions from Illinois’ multi-billion dollar settlement with tobacco companies in the 1990s.

Vrdolyak, 81, pleaded not guilty in 2016 to an indictment accusing him of tax evasion charges. The federal charge alleges he obstructed an IRS investigation into the tobacco settlement by hiding payments with Soso's assistance.

This story is so Illinois. Millions of that cash went to schemers like Vrdolyak.

Eleven years ago Vrdolyak pleaded guilty to bribery and fraud charges. Since 1973 over thirty members of the Chicago City Council have served time in federal prison.

If "Democracy dies in darkness," why did the Washington Post, in a Friday news dump. issue a non-apology for its biased coverage of the Covington High School kids and their confrontation at the Lincoln Memorial.

Like a petulant child, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez shrieks "I'm the boss." AOC supposedly warned members of the Democratic caucus they'll go on her target list if they don't kowtow to her socialist dogma.

Less than a year ago A-ock was a bartender. She was nutso then and she's nutso now.

But according to Tom Perez, the chairman of the Democratic Party, she's the future of the Dems.

Friday, March 01, 2019

Flint's ties to the transportation industry reach back before the development of the internal combustion engine automobile as it was a leading producer of horse-drawn carriages in the 19th century, which is why Flint is known as the Vehicle City.

Buick traces its founding to 1903, it was founded by David Dunbar Buick in Detroit and it moved operations to Flint the following year and began producing cars at what General Motors many years later dubbed "Buick City" at the site pictured here, which is between Industrial Avenue and James P. Cole Boulevard on the city's north side.

Those are not Buicks. On the south side of Flint is GM's Flint Assembly, which builds Chevy Silverados and GMC Sierras. Buick City appears to be a holding lot for these recently built pickups. It's unclear--to me at least--who owns the property. Wikipedia says, "The site was vacated by GM employees and site responsibilities were transferred to Motors Liquidation Company." But the latter, which was created after GM emerged from bankruptcy in 2011, no longer exists, again according to Wikipedia.

That is of course one of the many abandoned homes--this one is of course fire-damaged--near the old automobiles works.

Until the completion of Ford's River Rouge complex in 1928 in Dearborn, Michigan, Buick City was the world's biggest factory. In 1908 Buick was America's largest producer of automobiles, although it manufactured only 8,000 cars that year. The car business didn't take off until after World War I.

Another abandoned home with a collapsed portico.

It's also unclear when Buick City was razed. It occurred over many years, for sure. But when I looked at Google Maps Street View for Industrial Avenue--those photos are from 2011--many buildings were still standing.

In 1908 General Motors was incorporated in Flint. The following year GM acquired Cadillac, Oldsmobile, and the predecessor company of Pontiac. It was a heady era. The corporation was financially overextended, which led to Durant's ouster in 1910. The next year Durant co-founded the Chevrolet Motor Car Company. In 1916 Durant regained control of GM--but was forced out again in 1920. Yes, this is sounding a lot like the dot-com era of the 1990s. Of course it is. In the first thirty years of the 20th century Flint and Detroit were the Silicon Valley of that time.

Durant founded Durant Motors in 1921 but the company didn't survive the Great Depression.

David Buick died nearly broke in Detroit in 1928. Durant collected a pension from GM, but still had to manage a bowling alley late in his life to get by. He died in 1947.

Buick developed the first overhead valve engine, which was used in the Buick Model B in 1904. Most automobiles today are powered by an engine derived from that Buick design, so in a way if you own a car you are driving a Buick.

The drive from my home the Chicago area to Flint on February 13 was a brutal one. An unexpected snowstorm added a couple of more hours on to my trip. As I took these photos there were high winds and snow flurries, which made photography a challenge.

Yes, that's a tree growing from the porch.

By now you should realize that Flint is steeped in history, more so, in my opinion, than any American city of its size.

The general belief that the United Auto Workers was founded in Flint is false--it began in Detroit in 1935. But in the following year it organized a successful sit-down strike that was centered in Flint. That led to GM's recognition of the UAW in 1937, Chrysler followed suit the same year. Ford recognized the union four years later.

The bricks you see came from the Fisher Body #1 plant, one of the focal points of the sit-down strike. Pictured is a woman being dragged away by a cop with a nightstick, another woman is bringing food to strikers as a child looks on, and another is smashing a window with a baseball bat.

Another part of the memorial shows striking men sitting down. On of the sides of the base is a listing--to the current day--of the UAW presidents. Hey there, union big shots: No one cares who is the president of the UAW now or who was in charge twenty years ago.

We're back at Buick City.

Flint's recent history is mostly unhappy and of course its better days are well in its past. The decline of the domestic automobile industry hit Flint very hard, the city's hard times the 1980s was portrayed, with much embellishment and suspension of disbelief, in Michael Moore's Roger and Me. Moore grew up outside of Flint.

This forsaken home looks like something out of eastern Europe.

This 1922 Buick Coupe, photographed at the Skokie Backlot Bash auto show in 2017, was built in Flint.

The last vehicles produced at Buick City were the Buick LeSabre and the Pontiac Bonneville.

Flint's population peaked at just under 200,000 in 1960 when it was Michigan's second largest city. It now has a bit under 100,000 residents and its Michigan ranking has plummeted to seventh.

Another fire-damaged home.

Of course Flint was in the news a lot several years ago because of the Flint Water Crisis, which began when the Vehicle City switched from Detroit-supplied Lake Huron water to the Flint River.

What cities like Flint--and really every town in America needs--is more small homes like these to be built.

An American Foursquare with asphalt brick siding.

A final look at Buick City. The light blue mass in the distance is the pumping tower for the Flint Water District.

Side streets are neither plowed or salted in Flint, which made driving a real adventure in my sedan that day. Worse, Flint's roads and streets, as they are throughout Michigan, are in wretched condition. And snow obscures the many potholes and crevices.

Michigan, you should hold your head in shame. There should be warning signs as you enter the Great Lakes State.

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